Chapter 30 Mais Oui #2
Michelle gasped, and I followed her gaze.
She was pointing at a shop. The windows were lined with glass perfume bottles in all sorts of colors—rich emerald green, bright vibrant gold, and sapphire blue.
“Remember I told you about the perfume shop in Montmartre? This is just like it. I wonder if the store moved here?”
I shrugged, not knowing the answer, but remembering the conversation in my apartment perfectly.
“They exist solely because they’re pretty,” I said, repeating her words from our chat in my kitchen.
She beamed at me, her smile so inviting, then she tugged me into the stone doorway of the shop.
Off in the distance, I heard the click of shoes on the marble floor fading.
Someone must have left the café and headed out the other end of the passage.
“Admit it. You’re still trying to avoid spending the night with me, aren’t you?” I teased.
“No,” she said, shaking her head, looking me in the eyes. “I want to so much.”
My heart beat faster. “Why were you so resistant then?”
“Because I needed to stay separate from you,” she said, her fingers threading their way through my hair. “To protect my heart.”
I circled my arms around her waist. “And now you no longer need to protect it?”
“I can’t protect it anymore,” she said, tilting her chin up at me, keeping her gaze on mine. “It’s too late. I can’t fight this any longer.”
I should be terrified; I should shut down. But I did none of those things. I feathered my hand across her back, sneaking it under her shirt. She arched into me.
“Don’t fight it,” I told her.
“Jack,” she murmured, worry in her tone.
“Don’t protect it. I’ll protect it. I want to,” I said, moving even closer to her, spreading my palm across her smooth skin.
“I don’t know that you can.”
“I don’t either. But I want the chance. I want you.
I want all of you,” I said, never looking away.
I couldn’t. I was too far gone. My heart thudded painfully, beating out a new rhythm.
I half wanted to shout at it to stay cool, but I wanted to embrace it as well.
To revel in all that I felt for her. This living, breathing mix of everything I never expected to feel, but was powerless to stop.
She had stolen into my life in a random coincidence, and now I was driven with need for her.
“Don’t you realize? You have all of me. I am yours. Completely,” she said, taking her time with every word, and each of them landed deeper and deeper inside me. Hooking into me.
I moved my hands to her cheeks. I held her face and stared into her brown eyes. They were so inviting, so trusting, and I could barely hold back anymore. I felt so much for her. It was bubbling up, overwhelming me, threatening to spill out.
“Michelle,” I whispered, my voice as ragged as the beating of my heart. “I love everything about being with you.”
“I love being with you.”
“I don’t want to think about not being with you.
” I brushed her cheek with my calloused fingertips; her skin was still wet from the rain.
I pressed my groin against her, grinding as I kissed her, pushing her hard against the stone wall of the doorway, where we were concealed from any patrons at the café.
My mind was on one thing—getting her back to the hotel room as quickly as possible.
But she was faster. Her hands were on my zipper.
“Make love to me now,” she said to me, a soft but oh-so-clear command.
Like a straight shot of desire, my body thrummed with need from her heated request. Lust took over, even as I glanced down the hallway.
We were all alone, but the risk was palpable.
We could be caught, seen, spotted. Or we could be seen and ignored.
The more likely option. But as my zipper came undone and she reached into my boxers, wrapping those soft, talented fingers around me, nothing else mattered.
I didn’t care about anything but her. I couldn’t care. My need for her was all I felt. Not having her now felt like the bigger risk.
I reached under her skirt, palming her. “Your panties are drenched,” I said, yanking them to the side, revealing her, so wet and ready for me. I hitched up her thigh, wrapped her leg around my waist, and guided my cock into her. She drew a sharp breath and moaned loudly.
Instantly, I covered her mouth with my hand. “I’m going to fuck you in public, and you’re going to be quiet. Nod if you understand.”
She nodded, and I kept my hand over her lips as I thrust into her. Her wet heat coated my cock. “Oh, beautiful, your pussy is soaking wet. You love Paris, don’t you?”
A muffled yes.
“And you love being able to fuck me in public, don’t you?”
Another nod as she grabbed my hip bones, holding on tight.
“And you love needing me so badly that you can’t even wait for the hotel, don’t you?” I said, releasing my hold ever so briefly to let her speak.
“Yes,” she moaned.
“Quiet,” I warned, covering her mouth once more. With my other hand, I held tight to her hip, my thumb digging into her flesh as I pumped. “You love that I want to fuck you anywhere. That I want to be inside your beautiful body everywhere. That I can’t ever get enough of you.”
She bit down on my palm, and he yanked my hand back.
“I love needing you,” she said on a pant, her erratic breaths telling me she was so close to coming.
She dug her nails into my skin. I could feel them deeply, like daggers, starting to draw blood.
The possibility that she was going to come so hard she’d break my skin made my cock throb harder inside her.
“Come on me,” I whispered harshly. “Come on me in public. Mark me with your nails.”
I felt her tighten around my erection, clenching against me, her body drawing me deep into her. She shuddered, and trembled violently, then shuddered again and again, her cries muffled by my hand.
While still covering her mouth, I dropped my face into her neck, tasting the slightest bit of sweat, mixed with rain.
I drove into her, the pressure in my body building, my balls drawing up as my climax started to overtake me.
“Michelle,” I said on a groan as my orgasm plowed through me relentlessly. Crashing through me, pulling me under.
I gripped her body harder, probably breaking skin too, needing to be as fucking close as I possibly could as I released myself in her, biting back my own groans of pleasure.
I collapsed against her, and I was vaguely aware that I might be crushing her against the wall.
I managed to slide away an inch so I wouldn’t hurt her.
She looked more beautiful than she had earlier.
Finally, I released my hold on her mouth. “I need you so much,” I said, and it was the barest truth. I had to be with her.
“I need you too, Jack,” she whispered, looking up at my eyes. Never breaking the hold. “I’m falling in love with you.”
The second the words made landfall, I tensed. Like a coil, tightening inside me, locking me up. A warning bell that this was the moment I needed to prevent. This was the line in the sand that neither one of us should even come remotely near.
A little voice told me to bolt, to run, to get the fuck away. Because saying those words could change everything.
But then just as quickly, I quieted that fear. I’d come far. I’d made progress, hadn’t I? I had to let go of the grip the past had on me. I had to let go of anything but my deep and absolute need for this woman who gave herself to me so completely.
I could give her what she’d given me.
Surely, I could.
I parted my lips to speak, but an invisible hand gripped my throat.
Came down hard on my mouth. The dark cloak of regret was like a silencer that choked all the words I wanted to say, turning them into dust on my tongue.
The old familiar standby had resurfaced inside me, wormed its way through my consciousness with the reminders of where words could lead.
Right words, wrong time. Wrong words, wrong time.
They were one and the same, and held too much possibility for pain.
I wanted to tell her everything. I wanted to tell her I was so afraid of saying the wrong thing, of hurting the right person, of loving the wrong way. Most of all, I was terrified of not loving enough. I wanted her to know all that was true and dark and painful inside me.
But I didn’t know how to give voice to that without causing more hurt. So I bottled it up. I tried to contain all that I felt for her in a small space so that it was manageable, so that it never could slither out and wound her.
The last thing I wanted was to hurt her, even though her words both scared and thrilled me.
I took the easy way out. I brushed my lips softly against her cheek. Then kissed her neck. Then her ear.
“I can’t ever get enough of you,” I said, whispering words that were wholly inadequate. But when I returned to her mouth, I hoped she knew in the soft press of my lips all the things I couldn’t say. I hoped that this—the physical—would be enough to assure her.
But I knew deep down it would never be sufficient. Not for a woman like her. Not for anyone who felt the way she did.
Michelle
As the sun peeked through the windows early the next morning, I stretched in bed, reaching my arms over my head, then casting my gaze at Jack.
He was gorgeous next to me, still sound asleep on his side, breathing the slow rhythmic breath of a deep sleeper.
I was tempted to run a hand down his bare arm, his muscles so strong.
Then to his trim waist, his hips exposed above the sheets.
But I turned away, slid out of bed, and headed to the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face.
I was safer by myself.
Perhaps Paris had been a bad idea.
Maybe we should have gotten separate rooms. Because here I was, exactly where I didn’t want to be. I didn’t want to share a bed, a night, a morning with someone who didn’t feel the same.
The night before had been magic; it had been stitched from a dream—the rain, the doorway, the perfume bottles. Him. All the things he’d said until that moment. I was sure he’d felt the same.
But then, I hadn’t said I was falling in love with him to get it in return.
I’d said it because it was unequivocally true.
Because it was impossible to keep it inside any longer.
I’d held back with him for so long. I’d been so protective, erected arbitrary boundaries to seal myself off from falling.
I’d tried valiantly to keep him at arm’s length, but he’d been so insistent, burrowing his way into my life, my heart, and my head.
Such a passionate man, and such a caring one too.
He was the ultimate lover, that sinful mouth and smoldering body a staggering combination.
There was so much more too. His tender side; his funny side; his warmth.
I was willing to bet he relished the appearance of Mister Cool, Calm and Collected, but beneath that veneer he was passionate and fiery, dirty and loving, and, unexpectedly, he was needy.
In exactly the way I wanted him to be. He needed me.
Or so it had seemed, I reasoned as I brushed my teeth, erasing the taste of the night.
After ten years of longing, after a whole damn decade of my heart being a goddamn one-way mirror, I thought there were iron gates around it, and it would take moving heaven and earth to knock them down. It hadn’t. It had taken one man less than thirty nights.
But once more, I was back where I’d always been. Loving too much. Feeling too much. The only one of us who felt this way. Putting myself out there to be met with a black hole in return.
I spat out the toothpaste and filled a glass of water, rinsing my mouth.
Soon, my rational side took hold, stuffing my emotional self back into the trunk where that side belonged.
This was all my fault. Jack had never pretended this was for love.
He’d laid the cards on the table that night at Gia’s.
And I’d agreed. Willingly. I hadn’t wanted to risk my heart either.
I didn’t have to keep risking it, I reminded myself.
Hell, if I’d managed to wash away Clay and the feelings I’d had for him, I could damn well do the same with Jack.
All I had to do was suck it down. To swallow up that annoying emotion of love, and replace it properly with desire.
I was a smart woman. I knew how to manage emotions.
Jack and I were lovers for thirty nights.
We were nothing more. I wasn’t going to ruin this trip, or this time, or my speech by letting emotions cloud me.
I was going to finish out this no-strings-attached affair the way it had started—physically.
I’d gotten into this to get over Clay, and that had happened.
I no longer pined for my friend. I no longer was in love with him.
That was all that mattered. I’d taken my medicine; I’d gotten the cure.
I didn’t need to push forward into something more.
I’d keep this affair precisely where it belonged—as an affair.
I was going to make damn sure no one could ever hurt me again.
Not Clay. Not Jack. Not anyone.
I turned on the faucet again, splashed some water on my face, and imagined washing away those words from last night, returning to what we were. We were a temporary fix to heal each other’s hearts. Nothing more.
Besides, I had my work. I was due on stage later today for my keynote. I could immerse myself in what I loved most deeply and always. My work was the great love of my life, and no one could ever take that away from me.